This panel discussion was held in October 2004 in observance of the one hundredth anniversary of Temple Beth Elohim in Georgetown, South Carolina. Relying on local records, L. C. Sloan reviews the history of eighteenth- and early-nineteenth-century Jews of Georgetown, in particular, Marcus Moses (1830-1884) and his children. Robin Heiden Shuler describes growing up in the 1960s and ’70s as a member of a small, close-knit Jewish community in predominantly Christian Florence, South Carolina, and how she drifted away from Judaism as a young woman in Charleston, but returned to it as a mother. Robert Schimek provides his perspective as a transplant from the Northeast. He proposes that the line between Conservative and Reform Judaism is becoming increasingly blurred and that Beth Elohim’s goal is to “make as many as we can . . . feel comfortable under our umbrella.” Panelists and audience members also briefly discuss the question of antisemitism in Florence and touch on the history of Temple Beth Or in Kingstree, South Carolina. For Mr. Sloan’s research materials, see L. C. Sloan collection, Mss 1036, Special Collections, Addlestone Library, College of Charleston.
Helen Goldman and Stephen Schein delivered this talk titled “The Jewish Community of Beaufort in 1905 and the Founding of Beth Israel Congregation” at the April 2005 meeting of the Jewish Historical Society of South Carolina (JHSSC), held in Beaufort, South Carolina, to celebrate the 100th anniversary of Beth Israel Congregation. Bernard Warshaw, president of the JHSSC, welcomes audience members and reads the governor’s proclamation honoring the anniversary, and Julian Levin introduces the speakers. Goldman and Schein discuss the history of the congregation and, more specifically, their grandfathers and founding members, David Schein and Morris Levin and their families.
Bernice Prayzer Rubin relates the stories of her parents, Esther Fromovitz and Mayer "Mike" Prayzer, who survived the Holocaust. Esther, originally from Romania, was held in Auschwitz for eleven months. Mike, who was from Poland, lived in ten different concentration camps over five years, and was freed from Dachau by the United States Army on April 1945. Esther and Mike met and married in Germany where they lived for two years after the war. In 1949, they and their firstborn, Morris, immigrated to the United States, settling first in Asbury Park, New Jersey, with the help of Esther's brother Al Fromovitz, who had arrived before World War II. They moved to Lorain, Ohio, following, Esther's sisters, who wanted to live near an uncle who had helped sponsor the surviving family members' immigration. Bernice, Morris, and younger brother Kenneth grew up surrounded by a large extended family. Bernice describes her parents' outlook on life and how they made a point of helping others. "The thing that just amazes me about my father and my mother is the fact that going through such a horrendous experience, they came out of this as people who were the kindest people . . . ." Mike spoke publicly to church groups and schoolchildren about his wartime experiences "because he always felt it was an important story and never to forget what had happened." Esther, who needed prodding, would not share her stories with Bernice and her brothers until they were older, Bernice reports, because she didn't want to "poison our minds against anything or to make it a traumatic experience for us." And there were some things her mom would never reveal. The transcript includes additional written information provided by the interviewee that expounds upon interview topics and discusses her parents' lives growing up in their respective villages, how her mother's family was rounded up, and what happened when they arrived at Auschwitz. For a related collection, see the Mike Prayzer papers, Mss. 1065-043, Special Collections, College of Charleston.
This panel discussion, "Looking at the Past and to the Future: From the Pulpit of Brith Sholom Beth Israel," was presented at "Jewish Roots in Southern Soil," a joint conference of the Southern Jewish Historical Society, the Jewish Historical Society of South Carolina, and Brith Sholom Beth Israel Synagogue [BSBI] in Charleston, South Carolina. At the time, BSBI was celebrating its 150th anniversary. The panelists were Rabbi Gilbert Klaperman, who served the Orthodox Brith Sholom from 1948 to 1950, prior to its merger with Beth Israel, also Orthodox, and Rabbi Hirsch Moshe Galinsky, who held the pulpit of BSBI from 1963 to 1970. Rabbi Klaperman notes "I came here in a period of tension," soon after a schism in 1947 when a significant portion of Brith Sholom's congregants left to form Conservative Synagogue Emanu-El. The loss of members and leadership that resulted from the split was "a kind of a blow to the ego" of the congregation and the split extended to families. "It was a terrible thing." Rabbi Klaperman was aware of a "pecking order" among the Jewish congregations in Charleston, which he associated with their degree of Americanization and religiosity. He closes his comments with this advice: "It's important for us to live together so that we can survive. We cannot rule anybody out of the Jewish community." Rabbi Galinsky recalls how he came to BSBI, stating that his additional duties as principal of the Charleston Hebrew Institute presented an appealing challenge. He was impressed with the people he encountered when he arrived in his new home city. "When you come to Charleston, you feel it, the unbelievable link to history." He describes how certain members of the Jewish community represented links to the past. Yet they had a vision of the future. He found the ties between Charleston's Jewish congregations and the connections among Jewish and non-Jewish Charlestonians remarkable. Rabbi Galinsky talks briefly about battling the Blue Laws, responding to the 1969 hospital workers' strike, and establishing a Head Start program at BSBI's day school for black children in the neighborhood.